It’s Kindergarten Crafts Time!

what do you do when you have to take like twenty tiny parts off of a big part so you can clean the big part, but are absolutely certain they’ll never make it back into the right places afterwards?

Not pictured: juice box and carrot sticks.

You bust out your grade school art skills and trace the Big Part, of course. In this case it’s the left-hand carriage plate of Mr. Royal, which you can see next to my sad artwork and perhaps understand why I needed to get at it. Yeah.

Anyway, then you tape your drawing to some cardboard and screw the tiny pieces into it wherever they belong. Bam, problem solved! If only I had some macaroni and white glue this thing would be perfect.

And in the less embarrassing activities category, I unexpectedly discovered something pretty cool lurking under the plating (such as it is) on the Royal’s lever arm.

From a caterpillar…

That unassuming lever arm is actually a beautifully sculpted chunk of solid brass. After a few moments of “oh crap, this looks nothing like it’s supposed to, what am I gonna do?”, I decided to polish it up and see how it came out.

… to a beautiful butterfly!

Very nicely indeed. Took easily twice as much sanding as the steel parts but it’s looking goooood. That handle is going to stand out and class up this baby even more.

So far I haven’t found any more brass in this typewriter except for one spot: the little tubey things holding one set of rollers. Nowhere else. It’s odd and totally random. Why there? Wear resistance? And if so, why not anywhere else?

Brass tubey things. Yes, I polished them too.

It is a mystery that may never be solved. Partially because the designer of the Royal #10 took the secret to his grave a long time ago, and partially because nobody really cares.

Me, I’m just happy that one thing on this damn typewriter surprised me in a good way.